


Frida Pond and the Philosopher's Stone

by Hm (jeanjacket), jeanjacket



Series: The Frida Pond Series [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Genderswap
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-10
Packaged: 2020-10-12 03:23:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20557418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeanjacket/pseuds/Hm, https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeanjacket/pseuds/jeanjacket
Summary: What if Harry Potter was Frida Pond, Ron Weasley was Rowan, and so forth? This is just the Harry Potter books with names and pronouns switched.This is a side project to avoid actually writing. Let me know if I forgot to replace anything or if there are any other mistakes. I am not typing this word for word, just copying and pasting from a pdf. I've also replaced the more recognizable surnames with different ones to avoid subconsciously thinking of them as their canon gender.





	1. The Girl Who Lived

Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense.

Mrs. Dursley was the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills. She was a big, beefy woman with hardly any neck, although she did have a very large chin. Mr. Dursley was thin and blonde and had nearly twice the usual amount of neck, which came in very useful as he spent so much of his time craning over garden fences, spying on the neighbors. The Dursleys had a small daughter called Ethel and in their opinion there was no finer girl anywhere.

The Dursleys had everything they wanted, but they also had a secret, and their greatest fear was that somebody would discover it. They didn't think they could bear it if anyone found out about the Ponds. Mr. Pond was Mr. Dursley's brother, but they hadn't met for several years; in fact, Mr. Dursley pretended he didn't have a brother, because his brother and his good-for-nothing wife were as unDursleyish as it was possible to be. The Dursleys shuddered to think what the neighbors would say if the Ponds arrived in the street. The Dursleys knew that the Ponds had a small daughter, too, but they had never even seen her. This girl was another good reason for keeping the Ponds away; they didn't want Ethel mixing with a child like that.

When Mrs. and Mr. Dursley woke up on the dull, gray Tuesday our story starts, there was nothing about the cloudy sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country. Mrs. Dursley hummed as she picked out her most boring tie for work, and Mr. Dursley gossiped away happily as he wrestled a screaming Ethel into her high chair.

None of them noticed a large, tawny owl flutter past the window.

At half past eight, Mrs. Dursley picked up her briefcase, pecked Mr. Dursley on the cheek, and tried to kiss Ethel good-bye but missed, because Ethel was now having a tantrum and throwing her cereal at the walls.

"Little tyke," chortled Mrs. Dursley as she left the house. She got into her car and backed out of number four's drive.

It was on the corner of the street that she noticed the first sign of something peculiar -- a cat reading a map. For a second, Mrs. Dursley didn't realize what she had seen -- then she jerked her head around to look again. There was a tabby cat standing on the corner of Privet Drive, but there wasn't a map in sight. What could she have been thinking of? It must have been a trick of the light. Mrs. Dursley blinked and stared at the cat. It stared back. As Mrs. Dursley drove around the corner and up the road, she watched the cat in her mirror. It was now reading the sign that said Privet Drive -- no, looking at the sign; cats couldn't read maps or signs. Mrs. Dursley gave herself a little shake and put the cat out of her mind. As she drove toward town she thought of nothing except a large order of drills she was hoping to get that day.

But on the edge of town, drills were driven out of her mind by something else. As she sat in the usual morning traffic jam, she couldn't help noticing that there seemed to be a lot of strangely dressed people about. People in cloaks. Mrs. Dursley couldn't bear people who dressed in funny clothes -- the getups you saw on young people! She supposed this was some stupid new fashion. She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel and her eyes fell on a huddle of these weirdos standing quite close by. They were whispering excitedly together. Mrs. Dursley was enraged to see that a couple of them weren't young at all; why, that woman had to be older than she was, and wearing an emerald-green cloak! The nerve of her! But then it struck Mrs. Dursley that this was probably some silly stunt -- these people were obviously collecting for something. . . yes, that would be it. The traffic moved on and a few minutes later, Mrs. Dursley arrived in the Grunnings parking lot, her mind back on drills.

Mrs. Dursley always sat with her back to the window in her office on the ninth floor. If she hadn't, she might have found it harder to concentrate on drills that morning. She didn't see the owls swooping past in broad daylight, though people down in the street did; they pointed and gazed open-mouthed as owl after owl sped overhead. Most of them had never seen an owl even at nighttime. Mrs. Dursley, however, had a perfectly normal, owl-free morning. She yelled at five different people. She made several important telephone calls and shouted a bit more. She was in a very good mood until lunchtime, when she thought she'd stretch her legs and walk across the road to buy herself a bun from the bakery.

She'd forgotten all about the people in cloaks until she passed a group of them next to the baker's. She eyed them angrily as she passed. She didn't know why, but they made her uneasy. This bunch were whispering excitedly, too, and she couldn't see a single collecting tin. It was on her way back past them, clutching a large doughnut in a bag, that she caught a few words of what they were saying.

"The Ponds, that's right, that's what I heard--"

"-- yes, their daughter, Frida--"

Mrs. Dursley stopped dead. Fear flooded her. She looked back at the whisperers as if she wanted to say something to them, but thought better of it.

She dashed back across the road, hurried up to her office, snapped at her secretary not to disturb her, seized her telephone, and had almost finished dialing her home number when she changed her mind. She put the receiver back down and stroked her chin, thinking. . . no, she was being stupid. Pond wasn't such an unusual name. She was sure there were lots of people called Pond who had a daughter called Frida. Come to think of it, she wasn't even sure her niece was called Frida. She'd never even seen the girl. It might have been Freya. Or Felicia. There was no point in worrying Mr. Dursley; he always got so upset at any mention of his brother. She didn't blame him -- if she'd had a brother like that. . . but all the same, those people in cloaks. . .

She found it a lot harder to concentrate on drills that afternoon and when she left the building at five o'clock, she was still so worried that she walked straight into someone just outside the door.

"Sorry," she grunted, as the tiny old woman stumbled and almost fell. It was a few seconds before Mrs. Dursley realized that the woman was wearing a violet cloak. She didn't seem at all upset at being almost knocked to the ground. On the contrary, her face split into a wide smile and she said in a squeaky voice that made passersby stare, "Don't be sorry, my dear madam, for nothing could upset me today! Rejoice, for You-Know-Who has gone at last! Even Muggles like yourself should be celebrating, this happy, happy day!"

And the old woman hugged Mrs. Dursley around the middle and walked off.

Mrs. Dursley stood rooted to the spot. She had been hugged by a complete stranger. She also thought she had been called a Muggle, whatever that was. She was rattled. She hurried to her car and set off for home, hoping she was imagining things, which she had never hoped before, because she didn't approve of imagination.

As she pulled into the driveway of number four, the first thing she saw -- and it didn't improve her mood -- was the tabby cat she'd spotted that morning. It was now sitting on her garden wall. She was sure it was the same one; it had the same markings around its eyes.

"Shoo!" said Mrs. Dursley loudly.

The cat didn't move. It just gave her a stern look. Was this normal cat behavior? Mrs. Dursley wondered. Trying to pull herself together, she let herself into the house. She was still determined not to mention anything to her husband.

Mr. Dursley had had a nice, normal day. He told her over dinner all about Mr. Next Door's problems with his son and how Ethel had learned a new word ("Won't!"). Mrs. Dursley tried to act normally. When Ethel had been put to bed, she went into the living room in time to catch the last report on the evening news:

"And finally, bird-watchers everywhere have reported that the nation's owls have been behaving very unusually today. Although owls normally hunt at night and are hardly ever seen in daylight, there have been hundreds of sightings of these birds flying in every direction since sunrise. Experts are unable to explain why the owls have suddenly changed their sleeping pattern." The newscaster allowed herself a grin. "Most mysterious. And now, over to Christa McGuffin with the weather. Going to be any more showers of owls tonight, Christa?"

"Well, Emily," said the weatherman, "I don't know about that, but it's not only the owls that have been acting oddly today. Viewers as far apart as Kent, Yorkshire, and Dundee have been phoning in to tell me that instead of the rain I promised yesterday, they've had a downpour of shooting stars! Perhaps people have been celebrating Bonfire Night early -- it's not until next week, folks! But I can promise a wet night tonight."

Mrs. Dursley sat frozen in her armchair. Shooting stars all over Britain? Owls flying by daylight? Mysterious people in cloaks all over the place? And a whisper, a whisper about the Ponds. . .

Mr. Dursley came into the living room carrying two cups of tea. It was no good. She'd have to say something to him. She cleared her throat nervously. "Er -- Anthony, dear -- you haven't heard from your brother lately, have you?"

As she had expected, Mr. Dursley looked shocked and angry. After all, they normally pretended he didn't have a brother.

"No," he said sharply. "Why?"

"Funny stuff on the news," Mrs. Dursley mumbled. "Owls. . . shooting stars. . . and there were a lot of funny-looking people in town today. . ."

"So?" snapped Mr. Dursley.

"Well, I just thought. . . maybe. . . it was something to do with. . . you know. . . his crowd."

Mr. Dursley sipped his tea through pursed lips. Mrs. Dursley wondered whether she dared tell him she'd heard the name "Pond." She decided she didn't dare. Instead she said, as casually as she could, "Their daughter -- she'd be about Ethel's age now, wouldn't she?"

"I suppose so," said Mr. Dursley stiffly.

"What's her name again? Felicity, isn't it?"

"Frida. Nasty, common name, if you ask me."

"Oh, yes," said Mrs. Dursley, her heart sinking horribly. "Yes, I quite agree."

She didn't say another word on the subject as they went upstairs to bed. While Mr. Dursley was in the bathroom, Mrs. Dursley crept to the bedroom window and peered down into the front garden. The cat was still there. It was staring down Privet Drive as though it were waiting for something.

Was she imagining things? Could all this have anything to do with the Ponds? If it did. . . if it got out that they were related to a pair of -- well, she didn't think she could bear it.

The Dursleys got into bed. Mr. Dursley fell asleep quickly but Mrs. Dursley lay awake, turning it all over in her mind. Her last, comforting thought before she fell asleep was that even if the Ponds were involved, there was no reason for them to come near her and Mr. Dursley. The Ponds knew very well what she and Anthony thought about them and their kind. . . She couldn't see how she and Anthony could get mixed up in anything that might be going on -- she yawned and turned over -- it couldn't affect them. . .

How very wrong she was.

Mrs. Dursley might have been drifting into an uneasy sleep, but the cat on the wall outside was showing no sign of sleepiness. It was sitting as still as a statue, its eyes fixed unblinkingly on the far corner of Privet Drive. It didn't so much as quiver when a car door slammed on the next street, nor when two owls swooped overhead. In fact, it was nearly midnight before the cat moved at all.

A woman appeared on the corner the cat had been watching, appeared so suddenly and silently you'd have thought she'd just popped out of the ground. The cat's tail twitched and its eyes narrowed.

Nothing like this woman had ever been seen on Privet Drive. She was tall, thin, and very old, judging by the silver of her hair, which was long enough to tuck into her belt. She was wearing long robes, a purple cloak that swept the ground, and high-heeled, buckled boots. Her blue eyes were light, bright, and sparkling behind half-moon spectacles and her nose was very long and crooked, as though it had been broken at least twice. This woman's name was Aurelia Hummel.

Aurelia Hummel didn't seem to realize that she had just arrived in a street where everything from her name to her boots was unwelcome. She was busy rummaging in her cloak, looking for something. But she did seem to realize she was being watched, because she looked up suddenly at the cat, which was still staring at her from the other end of the street. For some reason, the sight of the cat seemed to amuse her. She chuckled and muttered, "I should have known."

She found what she was looking for in her inside pocket. It seemed to be a silver cigarette lighter. She flicked it open, held it up in the air, and clicked it. The nearest street lamp went out with a little pop. She clicked it again -- the next lamp flickered into darkness. Twelve times she clicked the Put-Outer, until the only lights left on the whole street were two tiny pinpricks in the distance, which were the eyes of the cat watching her. If anyone looked out of their window now, even beady-eyed Mr. Dursley, they wouldn't be able to see anything that was happening down on the pavement. Hummel slipped the Put-Outer back inside her cloak and set off down the street toward number four, where she sat down on the wall next to the cat. She didn't look at it, but after a moment she spoke to it.

"Fancy seeing you here, Professor Mostafa."

She turned to smile at the tabby, but it had gone. Instead she was smiling at a rather severe-looking man who was wearing square glasses exactly the shape of the markings the cat had had around its eyes. He, too, was wearing a cloak, an emerald one. His black hair was drawn into a tight bun. He looked distinctly ruffled.

"How did you know it was me?" he asked.

"My dear Professor, I've never seen a cat sit so stiffly."

"You'd be stiff if you'd been sitting on a brick wall all day," said Professor Mostafa.

"All day? When you could have been celebrating? I must have passed a dozen feasts and parties on my way here."

Professor Mostafa sniffed angrily.

"Oh yes, I've celebrating, all right," he said impatiently. "You'd think they'd be a bit more careful, but no -- even the Muggles have noticed something's going on. It was on their news." He jerked his head back at the Dursleys' dark living-room window. "I heard it. Flocks of owls. . . shooting stars. . . Well, they're not completely stupid. They were bound to notice something. Shooting stars down in Kent -- I'll bet that was Delia Diggle. She never had much sense."

"You can't blame them," said Hummel gently. "We've had precious little to celebrate for eleven years."

"I know that," said Professor Mostafa irritably. "But that's no reason to lose our heads. People are being downright careless, out on the streets in broad daylight, not even dressed in Muggle clothes, swapping rumors."

He threw a sharp, sideways glance at Hummel here, as though hoping she was going to tell him something, but she didn't, so he went on. "A fine thing it would be if, on the very day You-Know-Who seems to have disappeared at last, the Muggles found out about us all. I suppose she really has gone, Hummel?"

"It certainly seems so," said Hummel. "We have much to be thankful for. Would you care for a lemon drop?"

"A what?"

"A lemon drop. They're a kind of Muggle sweet I'm rather fond of."

"No, thank you," said Professor Mostafa coldly, as though he didn't think this was the moment for lemon drops. "As I say, even if You-Know-Who has gone--"

"My dear Professor, surely a sensible person like yourself can call her by her name? All this 'You-Know-Who' nonsense -- for eleven years I have been trying to persuade people to call her by her proper name: Voldemort." Professor Mostafa flinched, but Hummel, who was unsticking two lemon drops, seemed not to notice. "It all gets so confusing if we keep saying 'You-Know-Who.' I have never seen any reason to be frightened of saying Voldemort's name."

"I know you haven't," said Professor Mostafa, sounding half exasperated, half admiring. "But you're different. Everyone knows you're the only one You-Know- oh, all right, Voldemort, was frightened of."

"You flatter me," said Hummel calmly. "Voldemort had powers I will never have."

"Only because you're too -- well -- noble to use them."

"It's lucky it's dark. I haven't blushed so much since Sir Pomfrey told me he liked my new earmuffs."

Professor Mostafa shot a sharp look at Hummel and said "The owls are nothing next to the rumors that are flying around. You know what they're saying? About why she's disappeared? About what finally stopped her?"

It seemed that Professor Mostafa had reached the point he was most anxious to discuss, the real reason he had been waiting on a cold, hard wall all day, for neither as a cat nor as a man had he fixed Hummel with such a piercing stare as he did now. It was plain that whatever "everyone" was saying, he was not going to believe it until Hummel told him it was true. Hummel, however, was choosing another lemon drop and did not answer.

"What they're saying," he pressed on, "is that last night Voldemort turned up in Godric's Hollow. She went to find the Ponds. The rumor is that Elijah and Jaylin Pond are -- are -- that they're -- dead."

Hummel bowed her head. Professor Mostafa gasped.

"Elijah and Jaylin. . . I can't believe it. . . I didn't want to believe it. . . Oh, Aurelia. . ."

Hummel reached out and patted him on the shoulder. "I know. . . I know. . ." she said heavily.

Professor Mostafa's voice trembled as he went on. "That's not all. They're saying she tried to kill the Pond's daughter, Frida. But she couldn't. She couldn't kill that little girl. No one knows why, or how, but they're saying that when she couldn't kill Frida Pond, Voldemort's power somehow broke -- and that's why she's gone."

Hummel nodded glumly.

"It's -- it's true ?" faltered Professor Mostafa. "After all she's done. . . all the people she's killed. . . she couldn't kill a little girl? It's just astounding. . . of all the things to stop her. . . but how in the name of heaven did Frida survive?"

"We can only guess," said Hummel. "We may never know."

Professor Mostafa pulled out a lace handkerchief and dabbed at his eyes beneath his spectacles. Hummel gave a great sniff as she took a golden watch from her pocket and examined it. It was a very odd watch. It had twelve hands but no numbers; instead, little planets were moving around the edge. It must have made sense to Hummel, though, because she put it back in her pocket and said, "Hagen's late. I suppose it was she who told you I'd be here, by the way?"

"Yes," said Professor Mostafa. "And I don't suppose you're going to tell me why you're here, of all places?"

"I've come to bring Frida to her aunt and uncle. They're the only family she has left now."

"You don't mean - you can't mean the people who live here ?" cried Professor Mostafa, jumping to his feet and pointing at number four. "Hummel -- you can't. I've been watching them all day. You couldn't find two people who are less like us. And they've got this daughter -- I saw her kicking her father all the way up the street, screaming for sweets. Frida Pond come and live here!"

"It's the best place for her," said Hummel firmly. "Her aunt and uncle will be able to explain everything to her when she's older. I've written them a letter."

"A letter?" repeated Professor Mostafa faintly, sitting back down on the wall. "Really, Hummel, you think you can explain all this in a letter? These people will never understand her! She'll be famous -- a legend -- I wouldn't be surprised if today was known as Frida Pond day in the future -- there will be books written about Frida -- every child in our world will know her name!"

"Exactly." said Hummel, looking very seriously over the top of her half-moon glasses. "It would be enough to turn any girl's head. Famous before she can walk and talk! Famous for something she won't even remember! Can you see how much better off she'll be, growing up away from all that until she's ready to take it?"

Professor Mostafa opened his mouth, changed his mind, swallowed, and then said, "Yes -- yes, you're right, of course. But how is the girl getting here, Hummel?" He eyed her cloak suddenly as though he thought she might be hiding Frida underneath it.

"Hagen's bringing her."

"You think it -- wise -- to trust Hagen with something as important as this?"

"I would trust Hagen with my life," said Hummel.

"I'm not saying her heart isn't in the right place," said Professor Mostafa grudgingly, "but you can't pretend she's not careless. She does tend to -- what was that?"

A low rumbling sound had broken the silence around them. It grew steadily louder as they looked up and down the street for some sign of a headlight; it swelled to a roar as they both looked up at the sky -- and a huge motorcycle fell out of the air and landed on the road in front of them.

If the motorcycle was huge, it was nothing to the woman sitting astride it. She was almost twice as tall as a normal woman and at least five times as wide. She looked simply too big to be allowed, and so wild -- long tangles of bushy black hair hid most of her face, she had hands the size of trash can lids, and her feet in their leather boots were like baby dolphins. In her vast, muscular arms she was holding a bundle of blankets.

"Hagen," said Hummel, sounding relieved. "At last. And where did you get that motorcycle?"

"Borrowed it, Professor Hummel, ma’am," said the giant, climbing carefully off the motorcycle as she spoke. "Young Lyra Black lent it to me. I've got her, ma'am."

"No problems, were there?"

"No, ma'am -- house was almost destroyed, but I got her out all right before the Muggles started swarmin' around. She fell asleep as we was flyin' over Bristol."

Hummel and Professor Mostafa bent forward over the bundle of blankets. Inside, just visible, was a baby girl, fast asleep. Under a tuft of jet-black hair over her forehead they could see a curiously shaped cut, like a bolt of lightning.

"Is that where -- ?" whispered Professor Mostafa.

"Yes," said Hummel. "She'll have that scar forever."

"Couldn't you do something about it, Hummel?"

"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy. I have one myself above my left knee that is a perfect map of the London Underground. Well -- give her here, Hagen -- we'd better get this over with."

Hummel took Frida in her arms and turned toward the Dursleys' house.

"Could I -- could I say good-bye to her, ma'am?" asked Hagen. She bent her great, shaggy head over Frida and gave her what must have been a very scratchy, whiskery kiss. Then, suddenly, Hagen let out a howl like a wounded dog.

"Shhh!" hissed Professor Mostafa, "You'll wake the Muggles!"

"S-s-sorry," sobbed Hagen, taking out a large, spotted handkerchief and burying her face in it. "But I c-c-can't stand it -- Elijah an' Jaylin dead -- an' poor little Frida off ter live with Muggles--"

"Yes, yes, it's all very sad, but get a grip on yourself, Hagen, or we'll be found," Professor Mostafa whispered, patting Hagen gingerly on the arm as Hummel stepped over the low garden wall and walked to the front door. She laid Frida gently on the doorstep, took a letter out of her cloak, tucked it inside Frida's blankets, and then came back to the other two. For a full minute the three of them stood and looked at the little bundle; Hagen's shoulders shook, Professor Mostafa blinked furiously, and the twinkling light that usually shone from Hummel's eyes seemed to have gone out.

"Well," said Hummel finally, "that's that. We've no business staying here. We may as well go and join the celebrations."

"Yeah," said Hagen in a very muffled voice, "I'll be takin' Lyra her bike back. G'night, Professor Mostafa -- Professor Hummel, ma'am."

Wiping her streaming eyes on her jacket sleeve, Hagen swung herself onto the motorcycle and kicked the engine into life; with a roar it rose into the air and off into the night.

"I shall see you soon, I expect, Professor Mostafa," said Hummel, nodding to him. Professor Mostafa blew his nose in reply.

Hummel turned and walked back down the street. On the corner she stopped and took out the silver Put-Outer. She clicked it once, and twelve balls of light sped back to their street lamps so that Privet Drive glowed suddenly orange and she could make out a tabby cat slinking around the corner at the other end of the street. She could just see the bundle of blankets on the step of number four.

"Good luck, Frida," she murmured. She turned on her heel and with a swish of her cloak, she was gone.

A breeze ruffled the neat hedges of Privet Drive, which lay silent and tidy under the inky sky, the very last place you would expect astonishing things to happen. Frida Pond rolled over inside her blankets without waking up. One small hand closed on the letter beside her and she slept on, not knowing she was special, not knowing she was famous, not knowing she would be woken in a few hours' time by Mr. Dursley's scream as he opened the front door to put out the milk bottles, nor that she would spend the next few weeks being prodded and pinched by her cousin Ethel. . . She couldn't know that at this very moment, people meeting in secret all over the country were holding up their glasses and saying in hushed voices: "To Frida Pond -- the girl who lived!"


	2. The Vanishing Glass

Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woken up to find their niece on the front step, but Privet Drive had hardly changed at all. The sun rose on the same tidy front gardens and lit up the brass number four on the Dursleys' front door; it crept into their living room, which was almost exactly the same as it had been on the night when Mrs. Dursley had seen that fateful news report about the owls. Only the photographs on the mantelpiece really showed how much time had passed. Ten years ago, there had been lots of pictures of what looked like a large pink beach ball wearing different-colored bonnets -- but Ethel Dursley was no longer a baby, and now the photographs showed a large blond girl riding her first bicycle, on a carousel at the fair, playing a computer game with her mother, being hugged and kissed by her father. The room held no sign at all that another girl lived in the house, too.

Yet Frida Pond was still there, asleep at the moment, but not for long. Her Uncle Anthony was awake and it was his shrill voice that made the first noise of the day.

"Up! Get up! Now!"

Frida woke with a start. Her uncle rapped on the door again.

"Up!" he screeched. Frida heard him walking toward the kitchen and then the sound of the frying pan being put on the stove. She rolled onto her back and tried to remember the dream she had been having. It had been a good one. There had been a flying motorcycle in it. She had a funny feeling she'd had the same dream before.

Her uncle was back outside the door.

"Are you up yet?" he demanded.

"Nearly," said Frida.

"Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon. And don't you dare let it burn, I want everything perfect on Ettie's birthday."

Frida groaned.

"What did you say?" her uncle snapped through the door.

"Nothing, nothing. . ."

Ethel's birthday -- how could she have forgotten? Frida got slowly out of bed and started looking for socks. She found a pair under her bed and, after pulling a spider off one of them, put them on. Frida was used to spiders, because the cupboard under the stairs was full of them, and that was where she slept.

When she was dressed she went down the hall into the kitchen. The table was almost hidden beneath all Ethel's birthday presents. It looked as though Ethel had gotten the new computer she wanted, not to mention the second television and the racing bike. Exactly why Ethel wanted a racing bike was a mystery to Frida, as Ethel was very fat and hated exercise -- unless of course it involved punching somebody. Ethel's favorite punching bag was Frida, but she couldn't often catch her. Frida didn't look it, but she was very fast.

Perhaps it had something to do with living in a dark cupboard, but Frida had always been small and skinny for her age. She looked even smaller and skinnier than she really was because all she had to wear were old clothes of Ethel's, and Ethel was about four times bigger than she was. Frida had a thin face, knobbly knees, black hair, and bright green eyes. She wore round glasses held together with a lot of Scotch tape because of all the times Ethel had punched her on the nose. The only thing Frida liked about her own appearance was a very thin scar on her forehead that was shaped like a bolt of lightning. She had had it as long as she could remember, and the first question she could ever remember asking her Uncle Anthony was how she had gotten it.

"In the car crash when your parents died," he had said. "And don't ask questions."

Don't ask questions -- that was the first rule for a quiet life with the Dursleys.

Aunt Charlotte entered the kitchen as Frida was turning over the bacon.

"Comb your hair!" she barked, by way of a morning greeting.

About once a week, Aunt Charlotte looked over the top of her newspaper and shouted that Frida needed a haircut. Frida must have had more haircuts than the rest of the girls in her class put together, but it made no difference, her hair simply grew that way -- all over the place.

Frida was frying eggs by the time Ethel arrived in the kitchen with her father. Ethel looked a lot like Aunt Charlotte. She had a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay smoothly on her thick, fat head. Uncle Anthony often said that Ethel looked like a baby angel -- Frida often said that Ethel looked like a pig in a wig.

Frida put the plates of egg and bacon on the table, which was difficult as there wasn't much room. Ethel, meanwhile, was counting her presents. Her face fell.

"Thirty-six," she said, looking up at her mother and father. "That's two less than last year."

"Darling, you haven't counted Unkkie Danny's present, see, it's here under this big one from Mummy and Daddy."

"All right, thirty-seven then," said Ethel, going red in the face. Frida, who could see a huge Ethel tantrum coming on, began wolfing down her bacon as fast as possible in case Ethel turned the table over.

Uncle Anthony obviously scented danger, too, because he said quickly, "And we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today. How's that, popkin? Two more presents. Is that all right?"

Ethel thought for a moment. It looked like hard work. Finally she said slowly, "So I'll have thirty. . . thirty. . ."

"Thirty-nine, sweetums," said Uncle Anthony.

"Oh." Ethel sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. "All right then."

Aunt Charlotte chuckled.

"Little tyke wants her money's worth, just like her mother. 'Atta girl, Ethel!" She ruffled Ethel's hair.

At that moment the telephone rang and Uncle Anthony went to answer it while Frida and Aunt Charlotte watched Ethel unwrap the racing bike, a video camera, a remote control airplane, sixteen new computer games, and a VCR. She was ripping the paper off a gold wristwatch when Uncle Anthony came back from the telephone looking both angry and worried.

"Bad news, Charlotte," he said. "Mr. Figg's broken his leg. He can't take her." He jerked his head in Frida's direction.

Ethel's mouth fell open in horror, but Frida's heart gave a leap. Every year on Ethel's birthday, her parents took her and a friend out for the day, to adventure parks, hamburger restaurants, or the movies. Every year, Frida was left behind with Mr. Figg, a mad old man who lived two streets away. Frida hated it there. The whole house smelled of cabbage and Mr. Figg made her look at photographs of all the cats he'd ever owned.

"Now what?" said Uncle Anthony, looking furiously at Frida as though she'd planned this. Frida knew she ought to feel sorry that Mr. Figg had broken his leg, but it wasn't easy when she reminded herself it would be a whole year before she had to look at Tibbles, Snowy, Ms. Paws, and Tufty again.

"We could phone Danny," Aunt Charlotte suggested.

"Don't be silly, Charlotte, he hates the girl."

The Dursleys often spoke about Frida like this, as though she wasn't there -- or rather, as though she was something very nasty that couldn't understand them, like a slug.

"What about what's-his-name, your friend -- Erwan?"

"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Uncle Anthony.

"You could just leave me here," Frida put in hopefully (she'd be able to watch what she wanted on television for a change and maybe even have a go on Ethel's computer).

Uncle Anthony looked as though he'd just swallowed a lemon.

"And come back and find the house in ruins?" he snarled.

"I won't blow up the house," said Frida, but they weren't listening.

"I suppose we could take her to the zoo," said Uncle Anthony slowly, ". . . and leave her in the car. . ."

"That car's new, she's not sitting in it alone. . ."

Ethel began to cry loudly. In fact, she wasn't really crying -- it had been years since she'd really cried -- but she knew that if she screwed up her face and wailed, her father would give her anything she wanted.

"Sweetie, don't cry, Daddy won't let her spoil your special day!" he cried, flinging his arms around her.

"I. . . don't. . . want. . . her. . . t-t-to come!" Ethel yelled between huge, pretend sobs. "She always sp-spoils everything!" She shot Frida a nasty grin through the gap in her father's arms.

Just then, the doorbell rang -- "Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Uncle Anthony frantically -- and a moment later, Ethel's best friend, Petra Polkiss, walked in with her father. Petra was a scrawny girl with a face like a rat. She was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Ethel hit them. Ethel stopped pretending to cry at once.

Half an hour later, Frida, who couldn't believe her luck, was sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Petra and Ethel, on the way to the zoo for the first time in her life. Her aunt and uncle hadn't been able to think of anything else to do with her, but before they'd left, Aunt Charlotte had taken Frida aside.

"I'm warning you," she had said, putting her large purple face right up close to Frida's, "I'm warning you now, girl -- any funny business, anything at all -- and you'll be in that cupboard from now until Christmas."

"I'm not going to do anything," said Frida, "honestly. . ."

But Aunt Charlotte didn't believe her. No one ever did.

The problem was, strange things often happened around Frida and it was just no good telling the Dursleys she didn't make them happen.

Once, Uncle Anthony, tired of Frida coming back from the barbers looking as though she hadn't been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors and cut her hair so short she was almost bald except for her bangs, which he left "to hide that horrible scar." Ethel had laughed herself silly at Frida, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day, where she was already laughed at for her baggy clothes and taped glasses. Next morning, however, she had gotten up to find her hair exactly as it had been before Uncle Anthony had sheared it off. She had been given a week in her cupboard for this, even though she had tried to explain that she couldn't explain how it had grown back so quickly.

Another time, Uncle Anthony had been trying to force her into a revolting old sweater of Ethel's (brown with orange puff balls). The harder he tried to pull it over her head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a hand puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit Frida. Uncle Anthony had decided it must have shrunk in the wash and, to her great relief, Frida wasn't punished.

On the other hand, she'd gotten into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens. Ethel's gang had been chasing her as usual when, as much to Frida's surprise as anyone else's, there she was sitting on the chimney. The Dursleys had received a very angry letter from Frida's headmaster telling them Frida had been climbing school buildings. But all she'd tried to do (as she shouted at Aunt Charlotte through the locked door of her cupboard) was jump behind the big trash cans outside the kitchen doors. Frida supposed that the wind must have caught her in mid-jump.

But today, nothing was going to go wrong. It was even worth being with Ethel and Petra to be spending the day somewhere that wasn't school, her cupboard, or Mr. Figg's cabbage-smelling living room.

While she drove, Aunt Charlotte complained to Uncle Anthony. She liked to complain about things: people at work, Frida, the council, Frida, the bank, and Frida were just a few of her favorite subjects. This morning, it was motorcycles.

". . . roaring along like maniacs, the young hoodlums," she said, as a motorcycle overtook them.

"I had a dream about a motorcycle," said Frida, remembering suddenly. "It was flying."

Aunt Charlotte nearly crashed into the car in front. She turned right around in her seat and yelled at Frida, her face like a gigantic beet: "MOTORCYCLES DON'T FLY!"

Ethel and Petra sniggered.

"I know they don't," said Frida. "It was only a dream."

But she wished she hadn't said anything. If there was one thing the Dursleys hated even more than her asking questions, it was her talking about anything acting in a way it shouldn't, no matter if it was in a dream or even a cartoon -- they seemed to think she might get dangerous ideas.

It was a very sunny Saturday and the zoo was crowded with families. The Dursleys bought Ethel and Petra large chocolate ice creams at the entrance and then, because the smiling man in the van had asked Frida what she wanted before they could hurry her away, they bought her a cheap lemon ice pop. It wasn't bad, either, Frida thought, licking it as they watched a gorilla scratching its head who looked remarkably like Ethel, except that it wasn't blond.

Frida had the best morning she'd had in a long time. She was careful to walk a little way apart from the Dursleys so that Ethel and Petra, who were starting to get bored with the animals by lunchtime, wouldn't fall back on their favorite hobby of hitting her. They ate in the zoo restaurant, and when Ethel had a tantrum because her knickerbocker glory didn't have enough ice cream on top, Aunt Charlotte bought her another one and Frida was allowed to finish the first.

Frida felt, afterward, that she should have known it was all too good to last.

After lunch they went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls. Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone. Ethel and Petra wanted to see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons. Ethel quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped its body twice around Aunt Charlotte's car and crushed it into a trash can -- but at the moment it didn't look in the mood. In fact, it was fast asleep.

Ethel stood with her nose pressed against the glass, staring at the glistening brown coils.

"Make it move," she whined at her mother. Aunt Charlotte tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge.

"Do it again," Ethel ordered. Aunt Charlotte rapped the glass smartly with her knuckles, but the snake just snoozed on.

"This is boring," Ethel moaned. She shuffled away.

Frida moved in front of the tank and looked intently at the snake. She wouldn't have been surprised if it had died of boredom itself -- no company except stupid people drumming their fingers on the glass trying to disturb it all day long. It was worse than having a cupboard as a bedroom, where the only visitor was Uncle Anthony hammering on the door to wake you up; at least she got to visit the rest of the house.

The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes. Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on a level with Frida's.

It winked.

Frida stared. Then she looked quickly around to see if anyone was watching. They weren't. She looked back at the snake and winked, too.

The snake jerked its head toward Aunt Charlotte and Ethel, then raised its eyes to the ceiling. It gave Frida a look that said quite plainly:

"I get that all the time."

"I know," Frida murmured through the glass, though she wasn't sure the snake could hear her. "It must be really annoying."

The snake nodded vigorously.

"Where do you come from, anyway?" Frida asked.

The snake jabbed its tail at a little sign next to the glass. Frida peered at it.

Boa Constrictor, Brazil.

"Was it nice there?"

The boa constrictor jabbed its tail at the sign again and Frida read on: This specimen was bred in the zoo. "Oh, I see -- so you've never been to Brazil?"

As the snake shook its head, a deafening shout behind Frida made both of them jump. "ETHEL! MRS. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"

Ethel came waddling toward them as fast as she could.

"Out of the way, you," she said, punching Frida in the ribs. Caught by surprise, Frida fell hard on the concrete floor. What came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened -- one second, Petra and Ethel were leaning right up close to the glass, the next, they had leapt back with howls of horror.

Frida sat up and gasped; the glass front of the boa constrictor's tank had vanished. The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out onto the floor. People throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.

As the snake slid swiftly past her, Frida could have sworn a low, hissing voice said, "Brazil, here I come. . . Thanksss, amiga."

The keeper of the reptile house was in shock.

"But the glass," she kept saying, "where did the glass go?"

The zoo director herself made Uncle Anthony a cup of strong, sweet tea while she apologized over and over again. Petra and Ethel could only gibber. As far as Frida had seen, the snake hadn't done anything except snap playfully at their heels as it passed, but by the time they were all back in Aunt Charlotte's car, Ethel was telling them how it had nearly bitten off her leg, while Petra was swearing it had tried to squeeze her to death. But worst of all, for Frida at least, was Petra calming down enough to say, "Frida was talking to it, weren't you, Frida?"

Aunt Charlotte waited until Petra was safely out of the house before starting on Frida. She was so angry she could hardly speak. She managed to say, "Go -- cupboard -- stay -- no meals," before she collapsed into a chair, and Uncle Anthony had to run and get her a large brandy.

Frida lay in her dark cupboard much later, wishing she had a watch. She didn't know what time it was and she couldn't be sure the Dursleys were asleep yet. Until they were, she couldn't risk sneaking to the kitchen for some food.

She'd lived with the Dursleys almost ten years, ten miserable years, as long as she could remember, ever since she'd been a baby and her parents had died in that car crash. She couldn't remember being in the car when her parents had died. Sometimes, when she strained her memory during long hours in her cupboard, she came up with a strange vision: a blinding flash of green light and a burning pain on her forehead. This, she supposed, was the crash, though she couldn't imagine where all the green light came from. She couldn't remember her parents at all. Her aunt and uncle never spoke about them, and of course she was forbidden to ask questions. There were no photographs of them in the house.

When she had been younger, Frida had dreamed and dreamed of some unknown relation coming to take her away, but it had never happened; the Dursleys were her only family. Yet sometimes she thought (or maybe hoped) that strangers in the street seemed to know her. Very strange strangers they were, too. A tiny woman in a violet top hat had bowed to her once while out shopping with Uncle Anthony and Ethel. After asking Frida furiously if she knew the woman, Uncle Anthony had rushed them out of the shop without buying anything. A wild-looking old man dressed all in green had waved merrily at her once on a bus. A bald woman in a very long purple coat had actually shaken her hand in the street the other day and then walked away without a word. The weirdest thing about all these people was the way they seemed to vanish the second Frida tried to get a closer look.

At school, Frida had no one. Everybody knew that Ethel's gang hated that odd Frida Pond in her baggy old clothes and broken glasses, and nobody liked to disagree with Ethel's gang.


	3. Letters From No One

The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Frida her longest-ever punishment. By the time she was allowed out of her cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Ethel had already broken her new video camera, crashed her remote control airplane, and, first time out on her racing bike, knocked down old Mr. Figg as he crossed Privet Drive on his crutches.

Frida was glad school was over, but there was no escaping Ethel's gang, who visited the house every single day. Petra, Denise, Jemima, and Lindsay were all big and stupid, but as Ethel was the biggest and stupidest of the lot, she was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Ethel's favorite sport: Frida Hunting.

This was why Frida spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around and thinking about the end of the holidays, where she could see a tiny ray of hope. When September came she would be going off to secondary school and, for the first time in her life, she wouldn't be with Ethel. Ethel had been accepted at Aunt Charlotte's old private school, Smeltings. Petra Polkiss was going there too. Frida, on the other hand, was going to Stonewall High, the local public school. Ethel thought this was very funny.

"They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall," she told Frida. "Want to come upstairs and practice?"

"No, thanks," said Frida. "The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it -- it might be sick. " Then she ran, before Ethel could work out what she'd said.

One day in July, Uncle Anthony took Ethel to London to buy her Smeltings uniform, leaving Frida at Mr. Figg's. Mr. Figg wasn't as bad as usual. It turned out he'd broken his leg tripping over one of his cats, and he didn't seem quite as fond of them as before. He let Frida watch television and gave her a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though he'd had it for several years.

That evening, Ethel paraded around the living room for the family in her brand-new uniform. Smeltings' girls wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers, and flat straw hats called boaters. They also carried knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later life.

As she looked at Ethel in her new knickerbockers, Aunt Charlotte said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of her life. Uncle Anthony burst into tears and said he couldn't believe it was his Ickle Ethelkins, she looked so handsome and grown-up. Frida didn't trust herself to speak. She thought two of her ribs might already have cracked from trying not to laugh.

There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when Frida went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. She went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in gray water.

"What's this?" she asked Uncle Anthony. His lips tightened as they always did if she dared to ask a question.

"Your new school uniform," he said.

Frida looked in the bowl again.

"Oh," she said, "I didn't realize it had to be so wet. "

"Don't be stupid," snapped Uncle Anthony. "I'm dyeing some of Ethel's old things gray for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished. "

Frida seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue. She sat down at the table and tried not to think about how she was going to look on her first day at Stonewall High -- like she was wearing bits of old elephant skin, probably.

Ethel and Aunt Charlotte came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from Frida's new uniform. Aunt Charlotte opened her newspaper as usual and Ethel banged her Smelting stick, which she carried everywhere, on the table.

They heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.

"Get the mail, Ethel," said Aunt Charlotte from behind her paper.

"Make Frida get it. "

"Get the mail, Frida. "

"Make Ethel get it. "

"Poke her with your Smelting stick, Ethel. "

Frida dodged the Smelting stick and went to get the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Aunt Charlotte's brother Danny, who was vacationing on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill, and -- a letter for Frida.

Frida picked it up and stared at it, her heart twanging like a giant elastic band. No one, ever, in her whole life, had written to her. Who would? She had no friends, no other relatives -- she didn't belong to the library, so she'd never even got rude notes asking for books back. Yet here it was, a letter, addressed so plainly there could be no mistake:

Ms. F. Pond

The Cupboard under the Stairs

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

The envelope was thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald-green ink. There was no stamp.

Turning the envelope over, her hand trembling, Frida saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter H.

"Hurry up, girl!" shouted Aunt Charlotte from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" She chuckled at her own joke.

Frida went back to the kitchen, still staring at her letter. She handed Aunt Charlotte the bill and the postcard, sat down, and slowly began to open the yellow envelope.

Aunt Charlotte ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust, and flipped over the postcard.

"Danny's ill," she informed Uncle Anthony. "Ate a funny whelk. . . "

"Mum!" said Ethel suddenly. "Mum, Frida's got something!"

Frida was on the point of unfolding her letter, which was written on the same heavy parchment as the envelope, when it was jerked sharply out of her hand by Aunt Charlotte.

"That's mine!" said Frida, trying to snatch it back.

"Who'd be writing to you?" sneered Aunt Charlotte, shaking the letter open with one hand and glancing at it. Her face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. And it didn't stop there. Within seconds it was the grayish white of old porridge.

"A-A-Anthony!" she gasped.

Ethel tried to grab the letter to read it, but Aunt Charlotte held it high out of her reach. Uncle Anthony took it curiously and read the first line. For a moment it looked as though he might faint. He clutched his throat and made a choking noise.

"Charlotte! Oh my goodness -- Charlotte!"

They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that Frida and Ethel were still in the room. Ethel wasn't used to being ignored. She gave her mother a sharp tap on the head with her Smelting stick.

"I want to read that letter," she said loudly.

"I want to read it," said Frida furiously, "as it's mine. "

"Get out, both of you," croaked Aunt Charlotte, stuffing the letter back inside its envelope.

Frida didn't move.

"I WANT MY LETTER!" she shouted.

"Let me see it!" demanded Ethel.

"OUT!" roared Aunt Charlotte, and she took both Frida and Ethel by the scruffs of their necks and threw them into the hall, slamming the kitchen door behind them. Frida and Ethel promptly had a furious but silent fight over who would listen at the keyhole; Ethel won, so Frida, her glasses dangling from one ear, lay flat on her stomach to listen at the crack between door and floor.

"Charlotte," Uncle Anthony was saying in a quivering voice, "look at the address -- how could they possibly know where she sleeps? You don't think they're watching the house?"

"Watching -- spying -- might be following us," muttered Aunt Charlotte wildly.

"But what should we do, Charlotte? Should we write back? Tell them we don't want--"

Frida could see Aunt Charlotte's shiny black shoes pacing up and down the kitchen.

"No," she said finally. "No, we'll ignore it. If they don't get an answer. . . Yes, that's best. . . we won't do anything. . . "

"But--"

"I'm not having one in the house, Anthony! Didn't we swear when we took her in we'd stamp out that dangerous nonsense?"

That evening when she got back from work, Aunt Charlotte did something she'd never done before; she visited Frida in her cupboard.

"Where's my letter?" said Frida, the moment Aunt Charlotte had squeezed through the door. "Who's writing to me?"

"No one. It was addressed to you by mistake," said Aunt Charlotte shortly. "I have burned it. "

"It was not a mistake," said Frida angrily, "it had my cupboard on it. "

"SILENCE!" yelled Aunt Charlotte, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. She took a few deep breaths and then forced her face into a smile, which looked quite painful.

"Er -- yes, Frida -- about this cupboard. Your uncle and I have been thinking. . . you're really getting a bit big for it. . . we think it might be nice if you moved into Ethel's second bedroom.”

"Why?" said Frida.

"Don't ask questions!" snapped her aunt. "Take this stuff upstairs, now. "

The Dursleys' house had four bedrooms: one for Aunt Charlotte and Uncle Anthony, one for visitors (usually Aunt Charlotte's brother, Danny), one where Ethel slept, and one where Ethel kept all the toys and things that wouldn't fit into her first bedroom. It only took Frida one trip upstairs to move everything she owned from the cupboard to this room. She sat down on the bed and stared around her. Nearly everything in here was broken. The month-old video camera was lying on top of a small, working tank Ethel had once driven over the next door neighbor's dog; in the corner was Ethel's first-ever television set, which she'd put her foot through when her favorite program had been canceled; there was a large birdcage, which had once held a parrot that Ethel had swapped at school for a real air rifle, which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Ethel had sat on it. Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they'd never been touched.

From downstairs came the sound of Ethel bawling at her father, I don't want her in there. . . I need that room. . . make her get out. . . "

Frida sighed and stretched out on the bed. Yesterday she'd have given anything to be up here. Today she'd rather be back in her cupboard with that letter than up here without it.

Next morning at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Ethel was in shock. She'd screamed, whacked her mother with her Smelting stick, been sick on purpose, kicked her father, and thrown her tortoise through the greenhouse roof, and she still didn't have her room back. Frida was thinking about this time yesterday and bitterly wishing she'd opened the letter in the hall. Aunt Charlotte and Uncle Anthony kept looking at each other darkly.

When the mail arrived, Aunt Charlotte, who seemed to be trying to be nice to Frida, made Ethel go and get it. They heard her banging things with her Smelting stick all the way down the hall. Then she shouted, "There's another one! 'Ms. F. Pond, The Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive -- '"

With a strangled cry, Aunt Charlotte leapt from her seat and ran down the hall, Frida right behind her. Aunt Charlotte had to wrestle Ethel to the ground to get the letter from her, which was made difficult by the fact that Frida had grabbed Aunt Charlotte around the neck from behind. After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit a lot by the Smelting stick, Aunt Charlotte straightened up, gasping for breath, with Frida's letter clutched in her hand.

"Go to your cupboard -- I mean, your bedroom," she wheezed at Frida. "Ethel -- go -- just go. "

Frida walked round and round her new room. Someone knew she had moved out of her cupboard and they seemed to know she hadn't received her first letter. Surely that meant they'd try again? And this time she'd make sure they didn't fail. She had a plan.

The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Frida turned it off quickly and dressed silently. She mustn't wake the Dursleys. She stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights.

She was going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number four first. Her heart hammered as she crept across the dark hall toward the front door --

"AAAAARRRGH!"

Frida leapt into the air; she'd trodden on something big and squashy on the doormat -- something alive!

Lights clicked on upstairs and to her horror Frida realized that the big, squashy something had been her aunt's face. Aunt Charlotte had been lying at the foot of the front door in a sleeping bag, clearly making sure that Frida didn't do exactly what she'd been trying to do. She shouted at Frida for about half an hour and then told her to go and make a cup of tea. Frida shuffled miserably off into the kitchen and by the time she got back, the mail had arrived, right into Aunt Charlotte's lap. Frida could see three letters addressed in green ink.

"I want -- " she began, but Aunt Charlotte was tearing the letters into pieces before her eyes.

Aunt Charlotte didn't go to work that day. She stayed at home and nailed up the mail slot.

"See," she explained to Uncle Anthony through a mouthful of nails, "if they can't deliver them they'll just give up. "

"I'm not sure that'll work, Charlotte. "

"Oh, these people's minds work in strange ways, Anthony, they're not like you and me," said Aunt Charlotte, trying to knock in a nail with the piece of fruitcake Uncle Anthony had just brought her.

On Friday, no less than twelve letters arrived for Frida. As they couldn't go through the mail slot they had been pushed under the door, slotted through the sides, and a few even forced through the small window in the downstairs bathroom.

Aunt Charlotte stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, she got out a hammer and nails and boarded up the cracks around the front and back doors so no one could go out. She hummed "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" as she worked, and jumped at small noises.

On Saturday, things began to get out of hand. Twenty-four letters to Frida found their way into the house, rolled up and hidden inside each of the two dozen eggs that their very confused milkman had handed Uncle Anthony through the living room window. While Aunt Charlotte made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy trying to find someone to complain to, Uncle Anthony shredded the letters in his food processor.

"Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?" Ethel asked Frida in amazement.

On Sunday morning, Aunt Charlotte sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.

"No post on Sundays," she reminded them cheerfully as she spread marmalade on her newspapers, "no damn letters today--"

Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney as she spoke and caught her sharply on the back of the head. Next moment, thirty or forty letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets. The Dursleys ducked, but Frida leapt into the air trying to catch one --

"Out! OUT!"

Aunt Charlotte seized Frida around the waist and threw her into the hall. When Uncle Anthony and Ethel had run out with their arms over their faces, Aunt Charlotte slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.

"That does it," said Aunt Charlotte, trying to speak calmly but pulling great tufts out of her hair at the same time. "I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"

She looked so dangerous with half her hair missing that no one dared argue. Ten minutes later they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car, speeding toward the highway. Ethel was sniffling in the back seat; her mother had hit her round the head for holding them up while she tried to pack her television, VCR, and computer in her sports bag.

They drove. And they drove. Even Uncle Anthony didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then Aunt Charlotte would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while.

"Shake 'em off. . . shake 'em off," she would mutter whenever she did this.

They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall Ethel was howling. She'd never had such a bad day in her life. She was hungry, she'd missed five television programs she'd wanted to see, and she'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on her computer.

Aunt Charlotte stopped at last outside a gloomy-looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Ethel and Frida shared a room with twin beds and damp, musty sheets. Ethel snored but Frida stayed awake, sitting on the windowsill, staring down at the lights of passing cars and wondering. . .

They ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast the next day. They had just finished when the owner of the hotel came over to their table.

"'Scuse me, but is one of you Ms. F. Pond? Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk. "

He held up a letter so they could read the green ink address:

Ms. F. Pond

Room 17

Railview Hotel

Cokeworth

Frida made a grab for the letter but Aunt Charlotte knocked her hand out of the way. The man stared.

"I'll take them," said Aunt Charlotte, standing up quickly and following him from the dining room.

"Wouldn't it be better just to go home, dear?" Uncle Anthony suggested timidly, hours later, but Aunt Charlotte didn't seem to hear him. Exactly what she was looking for, none of them knew. She drove them into the middle of a forest, got out, looked around, shook her head, got back in the car, and off they went again. The same thing happened in the middle of a plowed field, halfway across a suspension bridge, and at the top of a multilevel parking garage.

"Mummy's gone mad, hasn't she?" Ethel asked Uncle Anthony dully late that afternoon. Aunt Charlotte had parked at the coast, locked them all inside the car, and disappeared.

It started to rain. Great drops beat on the roof of the car. Ethel sniveled.

"It's Monday," she told her father. "The Great Humberto's on tonight. I want to stay somewhere with a television. "

Monday. This reminded Frida of something. If it was Monday -- and you could usually count on Ethel to know the days of the week, because of television -- then tomorrow, Tuesday, was Frida's eleventh birthday. Of course, her birthdays were never exactly fun -- last year, the Dursleys had given her a coat hanger and a pair of Aunt Charlotte's old socks. Still, you weren't eleven every day.

Aunt Charlotte was back and she was smiling. She was also carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Uncle Anthony when he asked what she'd bought.

"Found the perfect place!" she said. "Come on! Everyone out!"

It was very cold outside the car. Aunt Charlotte was pointing at what looked like a large rock way out at sea. Perched on top of the rock was the most miserable little shack you could imagine. One thing was certain, there was no television in there.

"Storm forecast for tonight!" said Aunt Charlotte gleefully, clapping her hands together. "And this lady’s kindly agreed to lend us her boat!"

A toothless old woman came ambling up to them, pointing, with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowboat bobbing in the iron-gray water below them.

"I've already got us some rations," said Aunt Charlotte, "so all aboard!"

It was freezing in the boat. Icy sea spray and rain crept down their necks and a chilly wind whipped their faces. After what seemed like hours they reached the rock, where Aunt Charlotte, slipping and sliding, led the way to the broken-down house.

The inside was horrible; it smelled strongly of seaweed, the wind whistled through the gaps in the wooden walls, and the fireplace was damp and empty. There were only two rooms.

Aunt Charlotte's rations turned out to be a bag of chips each and four bananas. She tried to start a fire but the empty chip bags just smoked and shriveled up.

"Could do with some of those letters now, eh?" she said cheerfully.

She was in a very good mood. Obviously she thought nobody stood a chance of reaching them here in a storm to deliver mail. Frida privately agreed, though the thought didn't cheer her up at all.

As night fell, the promised storm blew up around them. Spray from the high waves splattered the walls of the hut and a fierce wind rattled the filthy windows. Uncle Anthony found a few moldy blankets in the second room and made up a bed for Ethel on the moth-eaten sofa. He and Aunt Charlotte went off to the lumpy bed next door, and Frida was left to find the softest bit of floor she could and to curl up under the thinnest, most ragged blanket.

The storm raged more and more ferociously as the night went on. Frida couldn't sleep. She shivered and turned over, trying to get comfortable, her stomach rumbling with hunger. Ethel's snores were drowned by the low rolls of thunder that started near midnight. The lighted dial of Ethel's watch, which was dangling over the edge of the sofa on her fat wrist, told Frida she'd be eleven in ten minutes' time. She lay and watched her birthday tick nearer, wondering if the Dursleys would remember at all, wondering where the letter writer was now.

Five minutes to go. Frida heard something creak outside. She hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although she might be warmer if it did. Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that she'd be able to steal one somehow.

Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that? And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise? Was the rock crumbling into the sea?

One minute to go and she'd be eleven. Thirty seconds. . . twenty. . . ten. . . nine -- maybe she'd wake Ethel up, just to annoy her -- three. . . two. . . one. . .

BOOM.

The whole shack shivered and Frida sat bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.


End file.
